"Let's face reality. Customers prefer to be served by young demure and pretty stewardesses," so justified MAS corporate services general manager, Mohammadon Abdullah for grounding female cabin crew above 40 years of age against an allegation of sex discrimination by Maseu.( ' Malaysian Airlines defends 'young and pretty' policy' ).

For MAS to avert infringement of federal constitution's Article 8(2) (Non discrimination on grounds of sex), it must show that there is a rational differentia why the airline industry deserves the special consideration of not continuing to hire female cabin crew above 40 years old based on criteria of physical attractiveness and youth more than other businesses or industries not permitted by law to do so.

For MAS to establish that rational differentia, it has to build a convincing case that in the rarefied environment of flight 33,000 feet above sea-level, in which the whole bunch of smart-aleck cosmopolitans fly to and fro for some important reason and pay more than the fare of taxi, train, bus or LRT, they would expect, and justly deserve so, to be awaited upon by youthful and pretty stewardesses more than their normal fare of not so young or pretty waitresses in the pubs or the restaurants below.

MAS will have to show that because of this "higher expectation" of customers irrespective whether that expectation is reasonable or not - greater productivity, business and income to the airline will be generated from customer satisfaction from "young demure and pretty stewardesses", that justifies, on a rational differentia, this discriminatory criteria of youth and attractiveness.

In these respects, the first problem MAS encounters is the changed profile of air travellers.

This airline tradition of hiring young and pretty stewardesses must be started in time past when all if not majority of air travelers were heterosexual male customers with sense of self importance and a penchant to be pampered by SWTs (Sweet Young Things) in the stratosphere faraway from the restraint of wives and girlfriends left far behind below.

Nowadays, air passengers are a heterogenous and polyglot lot. There are children, elderly citizens, a sizeable number of female air travelers for whom youth and attractiveness of female flight attendant is not particularly a great selling point.

Politeness, helpfulness and amiability will go further. Experience in handling with noisy, unruly, cantankerous and difficult passengers who get drunk on free wines and beers would be valued. In the age of terrorism, resourcefulness, maturity and ability to think fast and act decisive are necessary to save lives and avert tragedy.

It is not as if our national airline is catering the same kind of customers as those who patronise our classy, opulent and glitzy nightclubs and karaoke joints in which the prerequisite of guest relations officers is that they are young and attractive females. Customers of these establishments are almost all male expecting 'male entertainment', whatever one may make that out to be.

To MAS I would say that in all these years of having pretty and young stewardesses, it did not exactly help its balance sheet from turning red.

As a national carrier of a country, which the prime minister had proclaimed an Islamic state, isn't it anachronistic, if not inconsistent with Islamic values that, as a marketing strategy, it should still stick to this airline tradition of catering to male chauvinistic predilection of being served by young and pretty female flight attendants?

Whatever happens to professionalism that is enhanced by knowledge, brainpower, and skills horned from experience isn't that more important for flight attendants that their beauty and youth?

Even on the yardstick of "beauty", it is not always measured by youth and the benchmark of 40 years for female cabin crew is entirely arbitrary.

There are some at 45 or even 48 with handsome features that are not easily ravaged by age, and a degree of voluptuousness attributed to it which many a male would find entirely agreeable but who are nevertheless forced to retire by contract to make way for less attractive twenty-odd year olds!

MAS cannot cite the sanctity of contract that forces retirement at 40 when the contract itself possibly runs counter to the supreme law of the federal constitution enshrining the right not to be discriminated on grounds of sex, and hence so conflicted, the contract must necessarily be struck down - unless of course MAS defends its policy that it does not discriminate on grounds of sex but only beauty as an attribute, epitomised by youth.

This is however equally untenable: it is, in the absence of a rational differentia, as bad to discriminate on grounds of physical appearance as gender since both are something a person is born to and cannot control.

Bottom-line, the issue will not hinge on niceties of legal interpretation whether Article 8(2) of federal constitution against discrimination on sex is contravened.

It is an issue of image based on practical and commonsensical considerations.

The question I ask is: Can MAS, which holds itself out as responsible corporate citizen, afford to be seen to discriminate against the right to work based on skill and experience by the exclusionary criteria of beauty and youth - the first being something that a person is born to and cannot determine or change, and the second, an inevitable process to which nothing within human power can stop?

For MAS to assert that physical attractiveness and youth are directly related to its customers' satisfaction and therefore constitute a bona fide occupational qualification, the national carrier will be denigrating its customer base and equating it to the level at par with that of nightclubs, karaoke establishments, modeling, advertisements and commercials, movies and acting industry in which physical attractiveness is a premium and unusually valued.

It is about time the airline shows some ingenuity to depart from tradition which is out of step with the times, and come out with criteria of selection that we can all apply effort and show competence and merits for recruitment and employment instead rather than cling on to criteria that we were born to and cannot control (like physical attractiveness) or fight against (age).